


Civil Twilight

by chiaroscuroverse



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alaska, Alien Biology, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Massage, Post-Episode: s01e06 Dalek, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-12
Updated: 2018-09-12
Packaged: 2019-07-11 14:08:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,032
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15973898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chiaroscuroverse/pseuds/chiaroscuroverse
Summary: “What’s day or night to us, anyway?”  Post-Dalek, some time for earthly beauty and healing touch.





	Civil Twilight

**Author's Note:**

  * For [justbygrace](https://archiveofourown.org/users/justbygrace/gifts).



> Happy Birthday to justbygrace/@deathlyfandoms, who inspired this by telling me all the wonders of Alaska and sending me [this inspirational photo](http://chiaroscuroverse.tumblr.com/private/178015324816/tumblr_peyh1lWQqx1tzot1w). Scientific accuracy not guaranteed :P

Rose decides not to guess where they’ve landed, only to let the Doctor do his reveal in the way that makes him the happiest. She turns a circle in the low sunlight and meets his soft smile with a bigger one of her own, realizing it’s the first time he’s cracked one in--how long has it been since they left the Utah bunker? Twenty-four hours? Thirty-six? He gestures out over the purple wildflowers and other grasses rising halfway up his body. “Shall we?”

She hesitates, hating to mention it, but-- “What about...him?” Her head jerks back toward the open TARDIS door. 

The Doctor’s smile fades before returning with a false note that makes her heart ache. “He’s not invited. At the moment.” His eyes pass along the horizon, where Rose turns to see purple and green mountains meeting the clouds and dropping into a river bed as low as the timbre of his voice by the time he asks, “If that’s all right?” 

“Of course, yeah! Just us.” Her hair blows across her face while she grasps his hand and squeezes with both of hers, hoping he really understands. “But, what if he tries to find us?” 

It’s only a day later and she has no more nerves to spend on Adam. 

The Doctor’s closed mouth quirks up as he catches her eyes and she’s flooded with relief at the faint return of the familiar twinkle. “He won’t. He’ll find himself making a complete circle to his room again. Maybe he’ll find the galley or game room--if he behaves.” She might have guessed. The chance to mess with a less-than-wanted passenger would be the thing giving him back a little spark. 

He takes her hand and leads them into the grasses, and it feels so very nearly, but not quite normal. Her arm tingles with the slight wrongness and she watches his body closely, trying to pinpoint the problem. Maybe it’s shorter steps, maybe the way his smile has yet to reach full bloom, or maybe the edge of awkwardness in the way he’s hunching his back. She swallows more regret for not noticing anything was wrong when she turned up at the TARDIS with _company_. 

It will be okay, because they’re here now, together, alone in a temperate wilderness, and he wants to show her something. 

“Here we are, a room with a view,” announces the Doctor, and Rose sees it--a small log cabin on stilts, rising out of the brush. He’s let her hand go to stalk ahead and give the stilts and ladder a good shake and a few smacks from the palm of his hand. “Fantastic. Solid as I remember.” He steps back and waves at the ladder. “Go on!”

Rose’s delight overflows into her face, and finally-- _finally_ \--a real, full, Doctorish smile fills his. She climbs the ladder in a hurry as the Doctor calls to her about getting the door open. No problem. There’s only a leather string latch, and then she swings it wide. No cloud of dust--the tiny room is clean, as well as brighter than she expected--an orange glow spills from a window built into the side. She crawls over the threshold and stands. 

Most of the space is occupied by a pallet bed with a dust cover. There is a small spigot and a few lockers, possibly holding supplies, she speculates. Not much else. She turns back to look for the Doctor, having expected him to be right behind her. More suspicions confirmed. He’s moving too slowly up the ladder--for him. 

She waits until he leans heavily on the wooden door frame, long legs stretched across the log platform between the room and the ladder. She sits next to him and nuzzles into his leather jacket.

“You’re hurt.”

He doesn’t deny it, or say anything at all. Slowly, his shoulder shrugs under her cheek. 

“I think we should talk about what happened.”

A moment passes before he responds. “Didn’t we say enough in front of the Dalek?”

She swallows some frustration. “Not really--look, I wasn’t thinkin’, when I invited Adam, just wanted to--I don’t even know. But I didn’t know you needed help.” 

“It’s fine.”

“You’re not fine. I can see.”

“A little sore.” He waves dismissively. “But here’s what I wanted to show you.” He gestures at the horizon. “What time do you think it is?” 

“Trick question, are we on Earth? Then late afternoon.” 

“Yes.” His chest rumbles with a laugh. “Though I suppose it’s still a trick question. It’s actually after 21:30.” 

By now she knows to wait, so she tilts her head and indulges in tracing the lines of his profile with her eyes. 

“The summer solstice is approaching, which means night will never completely fall. We’re in Alaska, 20th century, no one within a hundred miles, and absolutely nothing should be happening that requires our attention anywhere else.” He turns to her, glancing ever so quickly at the teeth biting her lower lip. “I thought we could use a sunset.” 

She squeezes the closest thing to her hand, which turns out to be his thigh. “Thank you, Doctor. It’s gorgeous.” 

He hums a pleased note while she she takes in the vast wilderness surrounding their retreat. 

“But why make the cabin so high?”

He shrugs again. “Bears?” 

“Oi! You didn’t tell me that on the ground!”

“I know how fast you can run.” The teasing is back in his voice and she wants to laugh hysterically and also bite him. So she settles for burrowing harder into his side. He makes a nearly imperceptible sound, and she moves, afraid she’d caused some discomfort, but he adjusts himself against the doorway and firmly resettles her in his arms. 

The sun skims the mountains and they breathe together for long enough that she fancies herself melting into him and experiencing their motion relative to the sun in the exact way he can. She’s almost, almost caught hold of this ephemeral string when he speaks.

“It’s time.” As he says it, the sun dips under the horizon, spreading pinks and purples and streaks of gold. She sighs happily and gets a squeeze in return. “And that’s about where it will stay. We’ll have hours of this half-light now before it rises again. As long as the sun is less than 6 degrees under the horizon, they call it civil twilight and it’s officially part of the daytime.” 

She can still see for a long way in the dim light, and she tells him the bears can feel free to come by now, since their spot feels nearly as protected as when they observe from the TARDIS. She lays a hand on his chest, aiming to rest it on his jacket, but where she lands the lapels have spilled open, and her fingers drop inside and skim maroon wool. If she were to press into his flesh, would it be his lowest rib or belly? She ponders this for a moment and dares to lightly drag her fingertips back and forth across the fabric. The light feels more surreal the longer it doesn’t grow darker, like they’ve stopped time, held back the night.

All is quiet but the background hum of nature, until he inhales deeply, and she gets an answer to what lies beneath when his rib cage meets her fingers _._ But he’s pushing her to sit up. “You’ll love this. Look at the sky--as far around this side as you can get.”

She has to clamber over him a bit to get to it. He steadies her hips and encourages her to go farther, and she sees. “Oh!” 

That side of the sky is dark, and a half moon shines in the center. She comes back, using him for leverage, to look the other way. There, twilight--and the sky still shimmers with sunset rays, after all this time. The Doctor smiles proudly. 

“It’s day and night at the same time!” she says happily. “And right here on Earth!”

“Wonders you didn’t even know you had.”

“It’s amazing! You’re right, we did need this. After...everything.”

His smile never fails but by now she can recognize the shadow falling across his eyes. She tilts her head and holds his gaze, asks the question silently, her mouth moving to form _Doctor_ and she can see when he relents, chest falling, tension draining, going slack into the door frame. She’s still kneeling in front of him. 

“Rose,” he says, and it’s the mildest protest. 

“Adam said something--Van Statten treated the Dalek like all his specimens. And he had _you_ …” 

“Rose.” 

“I know he hurt you. I can see it in the way you’re moving.” 

“S’nothing. Lingering effects of muscle spasms from his--” His hand flips dismissively-- “device. The rest, well, it’s over and done with.”

She gives him a doubtful frown. 

“Trust me, been hurt a lot worse than this.” 

“Yeah? But it still hurts _now,_ doesn’t it? Maybe I can help. I can try an’ massage it out?”

His eyes widen and she sees it, right before he shutters it. 

_Hope_. 

But shutter it he does, and flips to a tease. “You? With those little hands?”

She glares exaggeratedly, because that’s her part to play, but her heart had skipped over the way he said it, and she feels fairly certain about waiting him out. 

“I should go to the masseurs on Vega Space Station, hands the size of platters, and you should see the forearms!” He’s taken her hand, and makes a show of examining it with his own, turning it palm up and back, dragging his fingers across her wrist. 

“Pity you don’t have one of _those_ masseurs, willing and in this cabin right now.”

“I suppose you’ve got decent enough muscle tone here.” He pokes at the pad of her palm.

“You’re about to find out how much muscle tone I have.” She makes a fist and flexes while her tongue goes to her teeth.

She expects a retort, but he pauses and locks her with his eyes, her hand trapped top and bottom by his, fingers moving on her wrist, and goose bumps spill up her arms and across the back of her neck. “Oh, I do know how strong you are,” he says, and she flashes on the memory of how he threw himself on her after the Dalek died. He draws fingers across the back of her hand, once and again _(“you have to be delicate”)_. “I don’t know if I should accept that. After everything, I should be the one taking care of you.”

“But do you want to? Accept it?” She watches his eyes. The barrier is palpable, but he’s dismantling it himself, from the inside, even though he sits slumped, stripped of his usual commanding posture. “‘Sides, you always take care of me, when I’m sick or hurt or whinging. Doctor...you don’t have to hide pain from me.”

His brows draw together quickly, then smooth. “‘Fraid it’s been getting bad, and might get worse before it gets better.” 

“Please, let me help you. I mean, if I can.” Doubt pours through her. “It might not help at all. Or if you don’t want me to be, I dunno, so _close_ , it’s fine.”

That hopeful, desperate look crosses his features again and she’s reminded of his face in the alley on the estate, asking her to come with him. “I think--it might help, if you really want to. You mean, here?” He glances into the shack. “Now?”

“Why not? Looks like a comfy spot. Nothing around to bother us and apparently the light is here to stay,” she gestures at the grayish glow of sky. “I don’t have any oil or anything though, but I can do it without.” 

“Might have something in my pocket.” 

“Course you do.” She grins happily at him and goes to see about the bed. Linens are stacked in a locker and she whips off the dust cover and rolls out a sheet across it, tosses a blanket on one corner, and pares down to her comfortable vest and jeans. “Come on then. Let’s see what we’re working with.” Lighthearted, but she’s afraid. 

He never stands--rolls to his hands and knees to get across the few feet between the door and the pallet, and sits on the edge. He takes his coat off slowly, guarding--he’s stopped trying to hide it. He unlaces and kicks off his boots. She hides her surprise when he reaches to his back to drag his jumper off. For all her cajoling, she hadn’t expected him to actually do this. Undress, right in front of her, vulnerable yet unashamed. She kneels in front of him, at first thinking the twilight is playing tricks on her eyes, making dark striations appear down his chest and abdomen. She touches one, unthinkingly, and he winces. 

“Oh,” she breathes, “‘m sorry, are you sure this will be ok?” 

“Yeah. Let me--” he gestures past her to the bed and crawls over to lie on his belly. “Oh, left pocket,” he says, on a relieved exhale. 

It’s not far down--she finds a pink glass bottle of oil with a ribbon tied around the top. She can’t read the writing etched into the glass, and even after a few blinks it doesn’t translate. 

“It’s from a plant that doesn’t grow here, sort of like almonds. Anyway, I bought it for you. Before. Made me think of you, how it smells.” 

Tears well in her eyes, but she blinks them away. “You’re gonna smell like me then.” His eyes are closed but she can see his lopsided grin in profile. 

“I can live with that. If you don’t mind sharing.”

“Not a bit. Ok, here goes.” She spreads a generous amount of oil on her hands, contemplates the positioning, and shrugs and crawls next to him. The shape of his back takes her breath for a moment. She has to start somewhere, so she decides to work from the dip between his hips. It gives her a great view of the tantalizing roundness of his arse under the black trousers and the belt still in place, like a barrier, a reminder. 

She drizzles enough oil to cover him with a few swoops of her hands. It’s minty in a sort of deep way, a hint of flowers, maybe? She’s not quite sure why this smell would be _her_ to him, but then with all his alien senses, who knew how how things came across to him. She returns to the small of his back and begins her strokes, thumbs from spine on out, and watches where his face is turned to the side. He doesn’t react until she’s a bit higher and presses into a very tight set of muscles outside his spine, and a grimace crosses his face. 

“Lighter?” She pauses, hands splayed. 

“No, no, it’s very good. Necessary. You can go deeper if you want.” 

She throws more weight into her hand, considers leverage, and swings her leg over his hips. She presses deeply and upward with the palm of her hand, spine and out, and his breath comes out in a soft ‘oof.’ He shifts back and forth, back pockets rolling against the inside of her thighs. She’s accelerated the intimacy, but he’s leaning into it. For a moment she’s dumbstruck, continuing her pattern, watching his skin spring out from under her fingers. He turns his head to the other side, and his fingers twitch against the sheet, next to his face, but his eyes don’t open. 

“Is this--is this okay?” Her voice wavers.

“Yes. Very. Thank you.” 

A giggle overflows. “My pleasure.” She scoots forward a little, has a wild notion to sit back on his bum and rest a minute, but ignores it to continue working up and out from his spine. The taxed muscles do relax under her fingertips in a satisfying way, so she searches out more knots in her pattern, making sure not to miss any skin. To that end, just at the point her thumbs pass under his shoulderblades, she decides work her way back down his sides. She counts ribs while her fingers drop one by one. 

When she digs into the soft fleshiness after his last rib is the first time he groans audibly. She pauses. “Doctor?” 

“Go on, go on. I need it. If you could...make your hands wide?”

“K. This?” 

He nods and she continues with flat hands, spreading pressure and affection into each touch. When she’s gotten so far around his waist that the tips of her fingers graze the sheets, she decides she’s pushed it enough and slides back to his shoulders and neck. It’s when she’s scooted over the small of his back she notices it--how much hotter his skin is getting where it’s been touched. There isn’t enough light to see if it’s turned pink, but she thinks it must be. She plays with his shoulder blades, rolling her thumb around and under and back to his spine. He’d been breathing deeply and evenly, but now didn’t seem to be at all, and she’d almost worry if it weren’t for the radiating heat. The silence is soft, rich, and she becomes aware of wind outside, rustling grasses, the calls of birds, river rushing away in the distance. Her hands have grown accustomed to the smooth drag of his skin underneath them. She fancies if she were to lift them now, she’d still feel it. 

Maybe the world could stop turning and she can stay here longer, touching him, able to look her fill of his body in this half light. And with that she takes the opportunity to gaze, wishing she could rub with more than her hands, and the familiar ache doubles her over. Her hair brushes his skin, and she wants to kiss him right along the path of her hands. Maybe a light kiss to the back of the neck...

She shakes it off. Her fingers dance up and down the back of his neck, spread and rise onto his scalp, and slip around his ears. He shudders, hard, under her, and it almost throws her off balance.

“Sorry,” she murmurs, whipping her hands away. 

“No, it’s good! Well, I should maybe explain--”

“You’re hot, you know!” She’d meant to deflect from her own lustful thoughts, but that was a failure. She laughs nervously, “I mean, your skin is warming up. I didn’t know you could, the way you usually feel.” 

“Ah. Well, it’s alien to you. It’s a feature of touch telepathy, you’re literally helping me more than you know. It’s not magic, but--”

“Wait, what do you mean, ’m doing telepathy?”

“Not like--you’re not transmitting thoughts or anything. But--how can I explain? I can and would heal on my own, but it’ll be speeded because of the stimulation. Nerve contact and another psychic presence. I--should have said--”

He rolls over, cautiously, and she drops her hands for balance, finding herself on all fours above his torso, his face inches from hers, his ears are definitely red, eyes searching hers, and lips--

She tears her eyes from his lips and sits back, not quite able to even out her breaths. “It’s okay, you didn’t need to explain, I wanted to make you feel better, however it works best for you.”

“I do feel better. Much. Too much even.” He drops his hands onto her knees. She imagines them traveling up.

“Do you need more work on this side? This is where he hit you, didn’t he? I think I’ve figured out how it went.”

His jaw clenches. “Nevermind the details. Now we’re _here_. No Daleks, no megalomaniacs.” 

She hums a comforting sound and feels a breeze lift her hair. “But, what about the, um, psychic healing. Here.” She drums fingers lightly on his collarbone and drags them across the bruise. His eyes close briefly. 

“If you want.” He pauses. “But your hands must be tired.” He picks one up in both of his and rubs circles across her palm with his thumbs. Tingles follow in his wake. She sighs, and he continues out to her fingertips. He repeats the motions on her other hand and this time presses her wrist to his lips and his tongue darts out. “That’s what I thought.” 

“What?”

This time he catches two fingertips between his lips. “It’s perfect on you.”

“On both of us, apparently.” She brushes her oily hands on his cheeks to get the message across and drops a kiss on his forehead. “Let’s get you taken care of.”

She scoots down his body, hovering, and touches the line of each bruise with a frown. She fights the urge to kiss them. She’s over his thighs again, and she knows--she won’t look or touch directly, not the way his eyes are resting on her--but she knows there’s a hard outline under his trousers, under his belt. It would be the confirmation she desperately craves, that he wants the way she wants, but she can’t bring herself to try changing the scene yet. And maybe...maybe it’s just a physical reflex. Even if not, it’s not to say he’d want to do anything about it, maybe he would want to live in the moment, take up the entire not-night swimming in the longing, the way she already is. She shifts enough to feel how her own body has reacted to his proximity and wants to groan loudly. 

But she holds it in. She takes more oil and makes her hands flat--the way he’d requested before--and strokes from the center outward. Psychic nerve connections, stimulating healing... She’s not sure what it all means, but surely thoughts are a part of it, so she imagines her love flowing from her heart to her fingertips. She doesn’t risk giving any extra time to his nipples as they pass under her palms, but watches them tighten in her wake. She’s gentle as silk passing over his belly, enjoying the way the oil glistens ever so slightly in this light. Her hands travel as far as she dares--thumbs rub across his hipbones. There’s no avoiding seeing his arousal now and she could easily brush her wrist against it while moving, but she carefully doesn’t. His eyes are closing as she looks back at his face. 

“Rose. Just one more thing, if you would. Go up again, like you did, but would you press harder? I’ll tell you if it’s too much.” 

“K. I’ll try.” She grips his legs with her knees for leverage and leans in, and her hands begin. He’s engaged all his stomach muscles, and again doesn’t seem to be inhaling, abdomen rock-hard where she’d been so careful not to hurt him on the way down. She presses harder, trying to give him exactly what he needs, and when she’s once again reached his ribs, he releases a breath with a loud groan. 

He nods at the “ok?” question in her eyes. She passes over his chest again and continues up to give his shoulders as much pressure as she can. Her body is starting to flatten and come in contact with his hips. Then his hands are on her legs, now on her back, one of her hands goes under his neck, she glances from the way his eyes lock on her lips to the way his chin is rising toward her, and her decision is made before she stops to think about it. Already accepting the kiss, slanting over him, feeling the moan in his throat. His hands have risen to the back of her head now, guiding her, he opens his mouth, invites her to take and she does.

By the time she pulls away to suck in air, she’s lying on him fully. Awareness penetrates the buzz in her head and she whispers something about not wanting to hurt him and starts to roll away, but he wraps arms around her and begs her to stay.

“It doesn’t hurt--not in a bad way. An--you’re here and you’re ok, and somehow you don’t hate me.” One hand tightens in her hair. 

“I could never hate you. Told you--” 

“I keep seeing you running for a closing door, behind my eyes. And I’m the one who did it.” 

Instead of arguing, she kisses his cheek and the side of his neck and burrows her hands further around him. 

“When I thought you were gone. I thought--”

“Shh, ‘m right here.”

His arms, wrapping her up. “Wish I could pull you inside me and keep you safe.” 

All she can do is kiss him again, deeper, tongues playing until he bites her lip. She groans and whispers his name. 

He responds to that sound with a grip that makes her gasp, and he pulls at her with a sort of desperation, guiding her body higher on his, taking advantage of access to her throat, collarbone. He murmurs something she barely recognizes except for the pleading and yanks at her top, and she’s whispering “anything, anything.”

His tongue passes over the swell of one breast, and he pulls down hard on her vest and bra together and catches a nipple in his mouth and sucks—hard, a moan in response to hers. She wants to scream, instead curls in, tucking her head against him, and closes her eyes to revel in the touch of his hands and tongue.

Eventually he takes his mouth away, long enough to say, “Off?” and he’s helping pull her clothes over her head and greedily pulling her back for more until what she wants second-most is to scream with joy, and _most_ \--

She reaches down to curl her fingers around his belt. “Can we get rid of all this?”

His head lifts, mouth still open, dazed, and she drags a hand across the stubble on his cheeks while he searches her eyes. “You want me naked, Rose Tyler?” 

She grins. “I really do!”

“You get to have anything you want.” His smile grows until he’s beaming, then turns a little sly. “At least until the sun comes up.”

She laughs, and the buckle is already falling open to her hands. “I s’pose we’ll see.” 

When the last of the clothes have fallen, she descends on him with kisses and wraps her hand around his cock. He makes a sound and she pulls back to find his eyes closed. 

“Can I do this?” she asks. He nods and his mouth falls open just enough that she’s compelled to suck at his bottom lip as she rolls her hand slowly toward the tip and back down. He shudders and seems so overwhelmed at being touched--it’s making her quiver too, but she takes the opportunity to look at his body, all appearing very human, except for the way his skin heats in her wake and how he doesn’t seem to breathe at all sometimes. His hands have stopped moving on her skin, now digging fingertips harder and harder--

With a gasp, he stops her hand. He starts to roll toward her, but she sees pain wash the fierce determination off his face. He shakes it off and relaxes to the bed. “Please, Rose?” 

“I’ve got you,” she whispers, and covers him with her body. She can’t stop kissing him, not the way he returns such passion. One of his hands tangles in her hair, the other goes between her legs to caress and explore, dip inside her. She moans into his mouth when his fingers reach her clit. After a few moments she’s had all she can stand and rolls her hips until they find each other and she’s finally pushing herself down onto his cock. 

She holds him, squeezes him, not caring about the sounds she’s making into his mouth, because he’s moaning with her. His hand is now on her hip, pulsing her onto him. She wants to be wild. She doesn’t want to hurt him. She starts to move, pushing off him a little, forming long strokes, watching his eyes close and brow knit. She wants it to last. She wants to come on him, so hard. 

She decides to drop her head and kiss wherever she can reach, neck, collarbone, following the rhythm he guides with his hands on her hips, riding the edge now for as long as she can. 

Then she’s sitting up, riding him, before realizing it’s because he was softly begging “more.” He places one of her hands near his ear. “Touch me here?” he whispers, and she does it without question, amazed to find him grow harder in response. She leverages her other hand onto his shoulder and fucks him harder, letting her eyes close to concentrate on the feel of him. When she opens them, he’s watching her and he’s glowing golden, and she realizes it’s sunshine spilling through the window. He fills his hands with her breasts, rolls thumbs across her nipples and she comes with a scream, not stopping, taking him faster even as pleasure continues to shudder through her, until she makes him come inside her, shouting her name. 

And only then she slows and falls to his chest, hair sticking to her face. She doesn’t want to leave him yet. “Did I hurt you?”

Laughter rumbles through his chest. “On the contrary, I’m pretty sure you’ve healed me.” 

“Yeah?” 

“Could do with a kip to make it stick.” He yawns--she’s never seen that before--and continues mumbling about hormonal cocktails and energy depletion, so she grabs her knickers for a flannel and settles into the crook of his arm. “It’s still the middle of the night for you,” he says. 

She looks at the sunshine, before fully rolling the other way, and tucks her face into him. “What’s day or night to us, anyway?”

He squeezes her hip in reply, and his hand goes slack. She closes her eyes, bathed in warmth and light, and lets the rise and fall of his chest lull her. 

_~fin~_


End file.
